Military's latest ship puts China in new league

With the Fujian's launch, the country's aircraft carrier fleet is behind only the U.S.

- BY ALBEE ZHANG

CHINA'S third aircraft carrier, the Fujian, on a maiden sea trial on May 7, 2024.

(DING ZIYU Xinhua)

With the commissioning of its third aircraft carrier, China now boasts the second largest number of such ships in the world, though it still lags far behind the 11 operated by the U.S. Navy.

The Fujian was officially put into service this month in a ceremony attended by Chinese leader Xi Jinping, the official Xinhua news agency announced.

Its electromagnetic catapult launchers mark a technological advance that will help the navy to project power deep into the Pacific as it seeks to assert power in disputed waters in the East China Sea, the Taiwan Strait and the South China Sea.

The Fujian is China’s first domestically designed carrier. Its first, the Liaoning, was refurbished from an unfinished Soviet ship that Ukraine inherited and later sold to China, while the second, the Shandong, was built in China based on the Liaoning’s design. All three carriers are named after coastal Chinese provinces.